Today is Saturday; 19th of the Iranian month of Farvardin 1396 solar hijri; corresponding to 10th of the Islamic month of Rajab 1438 lunar hijri; and April 8, 2017, of the Christian Gregorian Calendar.

1800 solar years ago, on this day in 217 AD, Roman Emperor Caracalla was assassinated after a 6-year reign by his guards while urinating at a roadside in Edessa in northern Mesopotamia (presently in Turkey), a year after he tricked the Iranians into believing that he was sincere in his peace and marriage proposal to the daughter of Parthian Emperor, Artabanus V (Ardavan in Persian), but then had the bride and guests massacred at the wedding celebrations at the royal palace in Arabela – present day Arbil in Iraqi Kurdistan. Of mixed Punic and Syrian descent, he was named Lucius Septimius Bassianus on his birth in Lyon, France, to the Emperor Septimius Severus. Of mean character, on the death of his father in what is now York in Britain, he was proclaimed joint emperor with his brother, Publius Septimius Antoninus Geta, whom he soon treacherously murdered in front of his mother. A contemporary account of Caracalla’s massacre of the Iranians says that a huge gathering had stood about casually, eager to see the bridegroom and expecting nothing out of the ordinary. Then the signal was given by the Roman emperor to his army to attack and massacre all. Totally astounded at this onslaught the people fled – wounded and bleeding. Artabanus managed to escape with a few companions, while the rest of the Parthians, lacking their indispensable horses, were cut down – for they had sent the horses out to graze and were standing about. The Roman army then carried out a campaign of massacres in northern Mesopotamia and around Media, where Caracalla dug open the royal tombs of the Parthians, and scattered their bones. The Iranians, however, soon regrouped and fought the Romans to a bloody standstill at the Battle of Nisibis (in today’s southeastern Turkey), making them pay war reparations of 200 million sestertii.

1616 solar years ago, on this day in 401 AD, the youngest emperor in Roman history, Theodosius II, was born to Emperor Arcadius at whose death seven years later he was crowned emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire. During his 42-year reign he presided over the outbreak of two christological controversies, that is, Nestorianism and Eutychianism, and fought an almost two-year inconclusive war with the Sassanid Empire of Iran. In 421, Bahram V was crowned the Sassanid emperor on the assassination of his father Yazdegerd I, who shortly before he had been killed, began a persecution of Christians as reprisal for attacks against Zoroastrian temples by Christians during his reign. Bahram continued this persecution, and among those killed was his father’s Christian counselor, James Intercisus, who was cut to pieces in Jondishapur. This incident, along with friction in trade ties and border issues, made Theodosius declare war on Persia in 421 AD. The conflict raged across the borders of the two empires, mostly in southeastern Turkey, northern Syria and to some extent in Armenia. In 422, the Romans and the Sassanids signed the peace treaty that returned everything to the situation before the war. Roman emperor Theodosius II, died at the age of 49

1378 lunar years ago, on this day in 60 AH, the infant Martyr of Karbala, Hazrat Ali Asghar (AS), was born in Medina to the Prophet's grandson, Imam Husain (AS). He was the youngest son of the Imam. He was only six months old when he was brutally martyred by an arrow shot by the heartless Harmala bin Kahel that pierced his tender throat, when his father took him in his arms and asked the cruel forces of Yazid to at least provide some water for the thirsty infant. Every year millions of Muslims around the world commemorate the martyrdom of the infant Ali Asghar in the month of Moharram by taking out processions of empty bloodstained cradles, followed by wailing mothers carrying children in their arms – a pathetic sight that brings tears to the eyes of even the hardest hearts. It is also customary to distribute milk to the children and others in the month of Moharram in memory of the Infant Martyr of Karbala.

1243 lunar years ago, on this day in 195 AH, Imam Mohammad Taqi (AS), the 9th Infallible Successor to Prophet Mohammad (SAWA), was born in the city of Medina. The mantle of Imamate rested on his shoulders at the tender age of 8 years following the martyrdom of his infallible father, Imam Reza (AS). Due to his proverbial generosity, not just in material matters but also in the realm of diffusion of knowledge and wisdom, he earned the epithet of al-Jawad or the Exceptionally Generous. His period of imamate or divinely-decreed leadership of mankind was 17 years, during which he groomed a great many scholars in various fields. His lively debates with scholars of various creeds and schools of thought are recorded in books of hadith and history. He reposes in eternal peace besides his grandfather, Imam Musa Kazem (AS) in the holy double-domed shrine of Kazemain, north of the Iraqi capital Baghdad. We hereby congratulate all Muslims across the world on the auspicious occasion of birth anniversary of Imam Jawad (AS), and later in our programme will present you a special feature on his life and times.

1141 solar years ago, on this day in 876 AD, the usurper Abbasid caliphate survived annihilation when pride and overconfidence cost the Iranian general, Amir Yaqoub ibn Laith Saffari, victory in the Battle of Dayr al-Aqoul at Estarband, 80 km southeast of Baghdad. Yaqoub Saffari, who from his base in Zaranj in Sistan, after taking control of Sindh, Baluchestan and Kabul, had carried the banner of Islam to the then Buddhist ruled areas of  Bamiyan, Balkh, Badghis, and Ghor (in present-day Afghanistan), now turned towards the west, and swept through Khorasan, conquering Fars and Khuzestan on his way to Iraq. Mu’tamid-Billah, the 15^th self-styled Abbasid caliph and murderer of Imam Hasan al-Askari (AS) – 11^th Infallible Heir of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA) – terrified at the idea of the Saffarids joining the raging Zanj revolt in Basra and southern Iraq, offered Yaqoub the governorships of Khorasan, Fars, Tabaristan, Gorgan, and Rayy, if he spared Iraq. Yaqoub, however, sensing the weakness of the caliphate, from which Egypt, North Africa, Syria and Central Asia, had already broken away, resolved to end Abbasid rule. He advanced north of Waset, but here the clever tactic of the pro-Abbasid Iranian general, Masrour al-Balkhi, in flooding the adjoining lands slowed down his march. This provided the Abbasids ample time to gather troops and Turkic mercenaries, and thus save their rule that had been established a century and 26 years ago in 750 by Abu’l-Abbas Saffah by overthrowing the Omayyads with Iranian help. The result of the battle, completely halted Yaqoub's advance, as he fell back broken-hearted after a valiant fight, and in the next three years that he was alive, did not make any campaigns in Iraq. In 879, his brother and successor, Amr ibn Laith concluded peace with the caliph. The Abbasids, who had become puppets of Turkic slave generals, continued to be in power, until all executive authority was taken away from them by the Iranian general, Moiz od-Dowla Daylami on the fall of Baghdad in 945 to the Buwaiyhids, who ruled Iraq, Oman and most of Iran for 110 years. Next the Seljuq Turks reduced the Abbasids to vassals. Finally in 1258, the Abbasid caliphate was thrown into the dustbin of history with the sack of Baghdad by the bloodthirsty Buddhist Mongol hordes of Hulaku Khan, the grandson of Chingiz Khan. 

999 solar years ago, on this day in 1018 AD, the renowned Iranian vizier of the Seljuqid Dynasty, Hassan Ibn Ali Tousi, known by his title Khwaja Nizam ul-Mulk, was born in Radkan village in the vicinity of the northeastern Iranian city of Tous, near holy Mashhad in Khorasan. His father was a financial officer of the Ghaznavid dynasty, He also initially served the Ghaznavids as chief administrator of Khorasan Province. Four years later with the rise of the Seljuqs, he served Alp Arslan and Malik Shah I as vizier. Under his guidance the Seljuq armies contained the Ghaznavids in Khorasan, rolled back the Fatemids in Syria, defeated other Seljuq pretenders to the throne, turned Georgia into a tributary state, compelled the submission of regional governors, and kept the Abassid Caliphs in a position of impotence. In addition to his administrative duties, he established in various cities, including Isfahan, Naishapur, Mosul, Basra, and Herat, educational institutes known as “Madrasa-e Nizamiyyah”, which were named after him. In many aspects, these schools turned out to be the predecessors and models of universities that were established in Europe in later centuries. Nizam ul-Mulk is also widely known for his voluminous treatise on kingship titled "Siyasat-Nama" or "Siyar al-Molouk" (The Book of Government). He also wrote a book titled “Dastour al-Wuzara”, for his son Abulfath Fakhr ul-Mulk on administrative norms.  He was assassinated near Nahavand en route from Isfahan to Baghdad at the age of 75. His son-in-law Muqatel bin Atiyyah, who was eyewitness to a polemical debate, says he was assassinated in the same year as Malik Shah I, after a debate between Sunni and Shi'ite scholars, which resulted in his conversion and that of the Seljuq sultan to the school of the Ahl al-Bayt of Prophet Mohammad (SAWA).

746 solar years ago, on this day in 1271 AD, the 4^th Turkic Mamluk Sultan (slave-king) of Egypt and Syria, Rukn od-Din Baybars al-Bandouqdari, conquered the impregnable fortress of Krak des Chevaliers by defeating the crusader occupiers and expelling them back to Europe. Known to Muslims as “Hisn al-Akraad” (Castle of the Kurds), it sits atop a 650-metre (2,130 ft) high hill east of Tartus, Syria, in the Homs region on the way to Tripoli in what is now Lebanon. The castle was made a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2006. Recently this fortress was liberated by Syrian troops from the Takfiri terrorists who are backed by US, Turkey, Israel and Saudi Arabia. Baybars, earlier as a general, had taken part in the resounding defeat of the 7^th crusade led by the French king, Louis IX, at the Battle of Fareskour in Egypt (1250) and the decisive Muslim victory over the Mongols at AinJalut in Palestine (1260).

735 solar years ago, on this day in 1282 AD, Ahmad Fanakati, the Persian Muslim of Central Asia, who for twenty years served as finance minister of the Mongol Yuan Dynasty of China and Chief Minister of Emperor Kublai Khan, was assassinated  by his jealous Chinese rivals, Wang Zhu and Gao Heshang. Born in Fanakat (or Banakat), a town on the upper Syr Darya or River Jaxartes in what was then Qara Khitai kingdom, he joined the service of the Mongols when they conquered his homeland. He was entrusted with state finances in 1262. He was successful in managing the financial affairs of Northern China that brought huge tax revenues to Kublai's new government. In 1270, he assumed the full power of the new financial department known as the Department of State. After the conquest of the Song dynasty in 1276, Ahmad Fanakati entered the financial matters of Southern China. He prepared a state monopoly in salt, which came to account for a large portion of state income. In his 20-year term of office, he created his strong faction with his clan and Persian and Turkic Muslims from Central Asia. Ahmad is usually portrayed as an evil bureaucrat in Chinese records, but other sources positively evaluate his assistance to Kublai's administration. The recent Mongolian studies also tend to make positive reference to his role in establishing the dynasty's unique financial system.

556 solar years ago, on this day in 1461 AD, Austrian mathematician and astronomer, Georg von Peurbach, died at the age of 37 in Vienna. He studied the Islamic scientist, Ibn Haytham’s book “On the Configuration of the World”, and replaced the Greek scientist Ptolemy's chords in the table of sines with the Islamic Arabic numerals that were introduced 250 years earlier in place of Roman numerals and which today are in use in the whole world (e.g. 1,2,3,4,5 etc.)

158 solar years ago, on this day in 1859 AD, Austrian-German philosopher, Edmund Gustav Albrecht Husserl, who established the school of phenomenology, was born in Prostejov (presently in Czech Republic). He broke with the positivist orientation of the science and philosophy of his day, and elaborated critiques of historicism and of psychologism in logic. Not limited to empiricism, but believing that experience is the source of all knowledge, he worked on a method of phenomenological reduction by which a subject may come to know directly an essence. He died in Nazi Germany in 1938.

67 solar years ago, on this day in 1950 AD, India and Pakistan inked the Liaqat-Nehru Pact in New Delhi after six days of talks. The signatories were Indian Prime Minister JawaharLal Nehru and Pakistani Prime Minister Liaqat Ali Khan. The treaty sought to guarantee the rights of minorities in both countries after the partition of the Subcontinent – Hindus in Pakistan and Muslims in India.

47 solar years ago, on this day in 1970 AD, the Bahr al-Baqar massacre was carried out by aircraft of the illegal Zionist entity, which deliberately bombed an Egyptian school in the eastern province of Sharqiyya (80 km north of Cairo), resulting in the martyrdom of 46 children and injury to 50 others. Earlier, on February 12 the same year, Israeli warplanes had bombarded an Egyptian factory, martyring and wounding 168 workers. On March 31, 1970, Zionist warplanes pounded the city of Mansurah, martyring 12 civilians and wounding 35 others. The usurper state of Israel has a bleak and bloody record of crimes against humanity.

22 solar years ago, on this day in 1994 AD, in Rwanda more than 1,400 Tutsis were massacred by Hutu militia at a church atop a hill in Kesho. About this time, when the commander of UN forces in Rwanda warned Ghana’s Kofi Annan, the head of the UN Peacekeeping operations that the Kigali government was planning to slaughter Tutsis, Annan’s office ordered General Romeo Dallaire of Canada against protecting the informant or confiscating arms stockpiles of the Hutus. Annan, who went on to become the UN Secretary-General in 1997, later claimed that he lacked the military might and political backing to stop the slaughter of more than 500,000 people.

9 solar years ago, on this day in 2008 AD, the Islamic Republic of Iran’s SenIran Auto plant in Thies, Senegal's second largest city, built its first Iran-Khodro Samand sedan. Iran Khodro is the largest carmaker in the Middle East, Central Asia and North Africa regions with annual production of more than one million various vehicles including cars, trucks and buses.

AS/ME